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Can common sense and economic necessity break the rule that a second Sydney Airport is out of bounds for politics in an election year at any level of government?

It was the Sydney Morning Herald which gave the notion a nudge today, with a report on further business and local government support for Badgerys Creek with a notably useful interactive graphic of the relevant noise contours for the existing airport and the proposed dual runway configuration of the Sydney West development.

The SMH and The Telegraph have been competing in the airport coverage stakes, and for those of us concerned about the future of the media as well as Sydney, this is good.

At the moment the coverage suggests two very unusual things are happening. One is that there is a major shift in public opinion toward building Badgerys Creek, and the other is that it is no longer a taboo topic in a federal election year.

A lot of people in Western Sydney don’t realise how far away from the flight paths they will be. Still, they do provide good cannon fodder for politicians to scare them and ‘heroically’ take their votes.